Open Today 12.00pm - 5.00pmAchieving your Goals in 2019
Published 31 January 2019 by Collins234
We all know January is the most socially acceptable time to talk about our goals or set intentions for the coming year. But what happens now we’re on the verge of February and those hopes and dreams seem a little idealistic?
Here are 7 small ways you can stay motivated for the rest of 2019.
1. Do a stock take
It can be easy to get overwhelmed by all the new things you want to achieve this year, but we should spend some time acknowledging the goals we already accomplished. Spend 15 minutes writing a list of the goals you hit in 2018. Creating this list can give you a boost as you review what you already completed that may have seemed intimidating at the time.
2. One hour a day
We recently stumbled upon this video of Arnold Schwarzenegger talking about how there’s never ‘enough time’ to spend on our goals. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mNDA-o9yJNw (It’s worth the 12-minute watch, or you can skip to 4:25 to see the relevant section). If you can put aside about hour a day, the cumulative effect of doing that one activity every day, over the course of a year (365 hours) means you are likely to really master that goal. This can get tricky if you are juggling work and small children, so start at 20-30 minutes and build up from there. If you think you have a digital addiction, iPhone and Android both have incredibly useful records of your usage in the ‘Screen Time’ or ‘Digital Wellbeing’ menus of your phone. These features track how long you spend using different phone apps each day, plus how many times a day we check / pick up our phones. Have a dig around in these figures to find extra time to put towards your goal.
3. Birds of a feather
Want to try something new but none of your friends do it? Check out ‘Meetup’, a free website that lists activities people in your area already do. https://www.meetup.com/en-AU/cities/au/melbourne/. You can meet new people or just try out a new hobby. It doesn’t need to be work related – don’t think networking events, look for fun, lighthearted meet-ups like a social choir, hiking, photography, badminton, rock climbing, volleyball or even ukulele.
4. Please don’t call them New Year’s Resolutions
Calling them ‘New Year’s Resolutions’ can make our goals even harder to stick to. Call them a monthly promise, agreement or pledge. some other name that doesn’t make you feel guilty by March when things aren’t exactly going to plan. According to this survey https://www.statisticbrain.com/new-years-resolution-statistics/ only 9 per cent of people who make ‘New Year’s Resolutions’ felt that they were successful in achieving their goals.
5. Do a ‘New Moon List’
One way to become more mindful of your goals (not just once a year) is to make a ‘New Moon List’. This involves writing a short list of intentions (up to 10), on a small piece of paper to carry around with you. Start each line in a positive way, such as ‘I am’, (rather than ‘I need / want’) then tuck your list into your phone cover or a special pocket of your wallet to keep it safe. At the end of the third quarter of the moon cycle, take 15 minutes to read through your list to see what manifested that month, then burn or tear up the old list before working towards your next month’s list. The first 48 hours after a new moon are said to be the most potent time to set these intentions. A new moon occurs every 29.5 days and the next new / full moon in Melbourne is on the 5th February, so now is a good time to start thinking about what you might want on your list. https://www.timeanddate.com/moon/phases/australia/melbourne
6. Tell me about it
Goals have a much better chance of surviving the year if you write them down, like a 42% higher chance! Or better yet – tell a friend, which can increase the likelihood of achieving that goal by a whopping 95%. Make the power of accountability work for you.
7. One step at a time
Keep things simple, and work towards making just one behaviour change per month. Sometimes we get a bit excited and want to change ‘everything’ at once. For instance if you want to lose weight, take the total number of kilograms you want to lose and divide it by 12 or 6 months. By thinking long term you are more likely to be able to stick to it and be able to celebrate the small wins along the way.
